http://www.nubiarepublic.com/2019/04/african-legendspharaoh-taharqa.html

Of all great Warriors and rulers to have walked the ancient world,many have had the priviledge to have surfaced from great households and powerful nations,some rose from humble beginnings and relatively obscure micro nations,albeit,they were great,mighty and, powerful with acts and deeds worthy of remembrance.Nevertheless,our person of interest was a warrior king whose one heroic deed out of his numerous ones stood out to be his greatest,not just to him and his race,but to the people by which the world owe the existence of two powerful religions;Judaism and Christianity.


Millenniums ago,the 24th dynasty of the Egyptian ruler-ship came to its end and eventually paved way for the 25th dynasty of ancient Egypt which marked the reigns of the black Kushite Pharaohs from the lands of Nubia which is modern day Sudan and South Sudan.Amongst the Nubian Pharaohs who ruled over Egypt,perhaps one stood out to be the undisputed greatest whose reign sparked into flames a civilization that has stood the test of time and is still with us today.

Jerusalem,the city of the great King David,the city of the temple of Solomon,pride of the people of Israel,a conduit of two great religions and,a land of dispute between two modern nations.Today,it serves not only as a pilgrim site,but also a tourist site which plays host to millions of Pilgrims and tourist across the globe every year with majority of these bulk coming from the Southern American continent and the sub-Saharan region of Africa.But do these Africans truly know that there was once a time when the safety and hope of the holy city of Jerusalem fell on the shoulders of a great king of black origin.He was the great Nubian Pharaoh Taharqa from the 25th Egyptian dynasty,but who was this great king?

Born to the great Nubian Pharaoh and Kushite King Piye,who was the first ruler of the Ancient Egyptian 25th dynasty,Taharqa blossomed at an early age as he witnessed his Kushite kingdom spread its tentacles into the ancient Egyptian kingdom and conquered lands after lands.After the reign and death of his father Pharaoh Piye,his uncle,Shabaka took over the mantle of power,thus becoming the second Nubian Pharaoh of Ancient Egypt.

It was during the reign of Pharaoh Shabaka that young Taharqa would come into prominence.At the tender age of 20,Taharqa witnessed the final conquest of Egypt as lower Egypt fell to the Nubian warriors thus,bringing about the unification of both lower and upper Egypt under the single ruler-ship of Shabaka.With the steady growth of Egypt under the Nubian Pharaoh,Taharqa assumed control of the Armed Forces which automatically placed him at the head of the military outfit of the whole of Egypt.Nevertheless,trouble was brewing in the Middle East and Asia Minor,and it was from Sennacherib,the vicious Assyrian ruler,grandfather to one of the greatest warrior kings of the ancient world;Ashurbanipal the great.With the growing power of both Kingdoms,an imminent clash was inevitable.

A great military strategist,Taharqa thought it wise to battle the Assyrians far away from Egypt thus,he set out with his Army and crossed the Sinai into Middle East were Sennacherib’s terror reigned supreme.This period also coincided with the reign of king Hezekiah,king of Judah.At such a time,much of the Hebrew territories had already been conquered by the Assyrian forces.Israel had fallen and its people taken captive leaving Judah as the only standing city under the watchful eyes of Hezekiah.With most of the lands of Judah conquered with the exemption of the capital city Jerusalem,Hezekiah acknowledging the superiority of the Assyrians,decided to barricade and block-out all intruders from his city while waiting for a possible negotiation with the Assyrian ruler.


Furthermore,the Bible seems to have acknowledged and recorded this epic saga as seen in the books of second Kings 19;8-9 and Isiah 37;8-9.The book of Second Kings(19;9-10) further read thus;now Sennacherib received a report that Tirhakah(Taharqa),the King of Cush,was marching out to fight against him.So he again sent messengers to Hezekiah with this word:”Say to Hezekiah king of Judah:Do not let the god you depend on deceive you when he says,’Jerusalem will not be given in to the hands of the king of Assyria’”.The relevance of these Biblical references gives credence to the fact that indeed there was an actual battle between the Nubian/Egyptian forces against the Assyrians.The epic confrontation between these two great civilizations played-out with Taharqa and the combined Nubian/Egyptian forces coming out victorious,thus routing and sending Sennacherib and his Assyrian forces back to the ancient city of Nineveh.This victory may have only served as a temporary setback for the Assyrian but,the significance of its timing and the scenario surrounding the beneficiaries mainly the Israelite,proved to be more of an extinction-saver.


Conversely,the great warrior eventually succeeded his Uncle Shabaka as king and 4th Pharaoh of the Nubian dynasty.Though,his time as Pharaoh of Egypt was short-lived,he managed to maintain the peace in both the lands of Kush and Egypt which was brought about by the previous campaigns of his father Pharaoh Piye and his uncle Pharaoh Shabaka.Wealth was also not a problem to him as it was recorded to have built new temples and,even rebuilt the fallen and desolate ones.He also erected the largest Pyramid in the Napatan region.


Sadly,this glorious chapter of the Nubian ruler was about to be closed forever.The Assyrian forces under Esarhaddon,son and successor of Sennacherib,this time,better equipped and prepared crossed the Sinai desert and began an invasion of Egypt in the year 677 BC,and by 671 BC,the city of Memphis had fallen to Esarhaddon along with several members of Pharaoh Taharqa’s family.Taharqa then fled into his ancestral land of Nubia.


Eventually,the end finally came when Taharqa,the great Nubia Pharaoh,met his match on the battlefield.The great Ashurbanipal,an equally formidable and seasoned warrior,son and successor of Esarhaddon in 664 BC,defeated Taharqa thus ending the Nubian dynasty in Egypt.Taharqa died in Thebes where he fled to and was later buried in Nuri in Northern Sudan.He was succeeded by his son Tantamani as King of Kush.


Nevertheless,one cannot but over emphasis the role of Taharqa in modern day history and religion.In the course of saving his people and kingdom at the battle front against the Assyrians,he had also unknowingly saved king Hezekiah and the children of Israel from an imminent apocalypse,considering the fact that the then king Sennacherib was a viscous and known destroyer of civilizations.For this very act,he had rescued a religion,which was still in its early stages of transfiguration into a more super religion;a religion which gave birth to Christendom and arguably Islam.This feat, Taharqa was able to achieve at the age of only Twenty.

Indeed,he was not only a skilled warrior and benevolent ruler,he was perhaps,the greatest black ruler of African origin the world has ever seen.


http://www.nubiarepublic.com/2019/04/african-legendspharaoh-taharqa.html


cc:Lalasticlala

www.nairaland.com/attachments/9270279_foundart9_jpeg6ed43c539b11524129320fba4c649c44

Nubian Pharoah Taharqa (Egypt & Nubia) 25th Dynasty Reign 690 – 664 BCE.
Taharqa was the one of the Great Napatan Nubian Pharoahs.

Hmmmm....interesting. We should have our history in our school curriculum.... if not...many more of us will condemn us for having no achievement or always being unable to be good, strong leaders.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-WNIxiO8LGM

A History Of The African King Taharqa

When black kings ruled the world